Defy

Daily Creative with Todd Henry

In this episode, we explore the nature of taking a stand.

Our guest, Dr. Sunita Sah (author of Defy), a professor at Cornell University and an organizational psychologist, joins us to delve deep into the concept of defiance. Dr. Sah proposes a new definition of defiance—acting in alignment with your true values when there is pressure to do otherwise. She reveals insights from her research that suggests most of us are conditioned from an early age to comply and how this conditioning affects our ability to act on our values.

We also discuss the five stages of defiance that individuals go through as they act according to their principles. Dr. Sah emphasizes the importance of explicitly knowing and writing down our values to ensure that our actions align with them.

Key Learnings:

1. Defiance Redefined: Defiance is not about rebellion but about acting in alignment with your true values, despite external pressures.
2. Conditioned Compliance: From a young age, we are conditioned to comply and this affects our ability to act in alignment with our values.
3. Insinuation Anxiety: We often hesitate to speak up or correct others because we fear insinuating that they are wrong or unethical.
4. Stages of Defiance: The five stages—tension, acknowledgment, escalation, threat of non-compliance, and act of defiance—help us understand the process of standing up to pressure.
5. Value Clarity: Knowing and explicitly writing down our values can help reduce stress and align our actions with our principles.

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